Nainital, March 4
Making optimum use of the time available before the model code of conduct gets implemented in the poll year, Chief Minister Ramesh Pokhriyal Nishank today carried out a whirlwind tour of Kapkot in Bageshwar district and Bindukhatta in Nainital district during which he made a series of populist announcements and laid foundations stones.

Seemingly rattled by a series of successful protest meetings across the region over the failure of the Nishank-led Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Government to deliver, the supporters of the party had ensured that his visit got the required hype. The local papers were full of advertisements released on the eve of his visit.

According to sources, Nishank laid the foundation stones for the roads between Saneti and Bakaudi, Pothing and Sobhakund, Arson and Baskuna, Syakot and Pathkyuda and Talla Bhantola and Jhankara in the Kapkot area of Bageshwar district.

He also laid the foundation stone for various other schemes and dedicated several projects worth about Rs 33 crore to the people of the Haldwani and Bindukhatta areas. These included tube-wells in Umedpur village of the Chorgaliya region and Devpur village of the Gaulapar region of Haldwani.

Trying a new technique at image building he initiated an interface between the public and the officials from various departments at Bindukhatta. The exercise led to a heated exchange of words with the public disputing the claims of the officials.

The rain turned out to be a savior as it led to the disruption of the exercise. Nishank also asked questions on various developmental schemes launched by his government from children and rewarded those who gave correct answers with Rs 500 currency notes.

Responding to the demand of the residents of Bindukhatta to declare the village as revenue village, Nishank said he agreed with the demand and his government would initiate the proceedings for giving it the status of a revenue village.

The Congress has been attacking Nishank for making populist announcements and has been questioning his ability to get the works announced by him implemented in the poll year. Senior Congress leader Bhupal Singh Bhakuni, while talking to The Tribune, said: “He is going around announcing schemes which he knows he will not be able to implement”.

The party has been questioning what Nishank has been doing over the two years past and the BJP Government over the four years past with regards to various developmental projects that had purposely been kept on the back burner. 

Haridwar, March 4
A truck fell into the Ganga Canal here this morning. However, the persons travelling in it escaped with minor injuries.As per the eyewitnesses present at the National Highway-58, the truck was trying to overtake a vehicle when it rammed into the roadside railing and fell into the canal near the Prem Nagar Ashram intersection. The passersby rescued the truck driver and his helper. Both were taken to the nearby hospital.

Meanwhile, the crowd of bystanders led to a traffic jam on the road. A policeman was posted at the spot. He regulated the traffic as a crane pulled the truck out of the canal.

Daulat Singh, a room attendant at a nearby hotel, said after he heard a loud noise, he came outside. He saw people were trying to rescue the truck driver and his helper.

Pithoragarh, March 4
Hospitals in this border district have now turned into referral centres, thanks to lack of staff in these hospitals. Poor patients, even the ones with minor diseases such as blood sugar, diarrhoea, asthma and jaundice, are being referred to either Haldwani or to private hospitals in Bareilly. This is causing difficulty to the patients and their families.

Chief Medical Officer (CMO) Dr SC Pant said, “In cases of special treatment like anesthesia, ENT, neurology, ultrasound, CT scan, dialysis, kidney failure or stone, laparoscopy, endoscopy and heart diseases, we are compelled to refer patients to specialised hospitals outside the district as the posts of the doctors created in the district hospitals are vacant from many years.”

Pant pointed out that 117 posts of doctors were created for various hospitals in the district, out of which 82 were lying vacant at present. The female hospitals were also facing a staff crunch, as 12 posts out of 21 were vacant.

“Even the vital posts of physician, eye surgeon, orthopaedic surgeon, radiologist and ENT surgeon are lying vacant. Even anesthesia is given by diploma holders,” said the CMO.

The district has only one hospital, two female hospitals, four community hospitals, 14 primary health centres and 32 sub-centres that cater to more than five lakh population of the district and the three districts of the adjoining Nepal. Even in these hospitals, the posts of the medical officers and other para-staff were also lying vacant, informed the CMO. “Some doctors joined last year when the government advertised the posts, but they have left after sometime,” said the CMO.

Dehradun, March 4
As part of the four-day protest, the Defence Instruments Employees Union under the aegis of the All-India Defence Employees Federation held a protest meeting in fron of the main gate of the Instruments Research and Development Establishment, Dehradun, here today.

Addressing the employees, union president Bimal Singh Negi said as many as 12 demands of the defence employees were pending with the Centre and have not been met so far despite repeated assurances.

Defence institutions situated across the country have been observing a protest for the past few days. The defence employees in Dehradun would observe a fast on March 14 followed by a boycott of work at their respective institutions on March 18. 

Nainital, March 4
The question of identity of the people is clearly linked to the political actions being witnessed in the country in the present times. An eminent historian stated this at the second convention of the Uttarakhand History and Culture Association (UHCA) on the topic ‘Towards a new history of himalayan region: Recent trends and discoveries’ held here today.

Talking to The Tribune on the sidelines of the convention, eminent historian Prof Chetan Singh pointed out that the emergence of the state was also a result of a movement for identity of the people residing in the region.

He said, “Very often the movement for the identity enters the political sphere, especially when there is no redress of the grievances. It is for redress of the grievances that you enter the 
political domain.”

When asked on the role the issue of identity was playing in the extreme left movement being witnessed in several parts of the country under the name of Maoism and Naxalism, Singh, while stating that he had not studied identity of the people involved in such movements, said, “One thing is clear that the people carrying out these movements are mostly tribal. These are the people who have seen themselves as separate, different and exploited having greater claims to their homeland.”

He said, “The community has always lived in complete harmony with the environment and trouble started only when the people from outside came to take control over the resources. They no longer have control over the resources and the political system does not give them space to assert their control. The poorest of the poor were not a part of the structured caste society and are the marginalised people.”

When asked about the continuing disillusionment of the people, who initially wanted a separate state and are now not satisfied with the state of affairs in the smaller states like Uttarakhand, he said such things were inevitable as things depend on how a community sees its future.

“The inherent inequality is everywhere. The main issue is the sharing of the cake and it does not stop. It is a democratic process where peaceful and democratic methods are used to decide issues,” said Singh.

The event concluded today and saw a large number of experts presenting their research papers on various issues related to history.

Dehradun, March 4
A nine-year-old girl was taken away by a leopard in Gwal village of Almora district last night.The Almora forest authorities today frantically searched for the body of the girl but they had failed to locate it till evening. The angry villagers, who gheraoed the forest officials, demanded that the leopard be shot down.

The man-leopard conflict has taken to alarming proportions this winter. A few days ago, a girl was mauled by a leopard in Bhilangana block of Tehri district. 

Dehradun, March 4
Sushila Dobhal, wife of ex-Hawaldar Shailandhar Dobhal of the EME Corps, had to approach the Uttarakhand Ex-Services League (UESL) to get her husband’s pension released. Her husband had died some time back.

UESL, an organization recognised by the state government and raised by ex-services officers to help out other fellow ex-servicemen, had a tough time in getting pension released for her as she did not have the mandatory document, a Pension Payment Order (PPO), which her husband never bothered to get made. The league had to go through the entire rigmarole to get the PPO made for her only then could she get the pension.

Hers is not the only case, but thousands others are lingering in the District Soldier Board (DSB) and other volunteer organisations because of the laxity and ignorance of the ex-servicemen who do not possess the requisite documents or get themselves registered with the DSB. This poses serious problems for them and their families later on when they approach the DSB to seek benefits or pensions.

Brig Rajender Rawat (retd), vice-president of the UESL pointed out, “Every ex-servicemen must update their Discharge Card (DC) and PPO so that their families do not suffer after their deaths. They must entail the information of their wives’ date of birth, nomination, status of their wards etc, so that their families get all the benefits which the DSB provides”.

The piling up of such cases has also emerged as the biggest challenge for the board whose president Col Anil Wadhwa (retd), while showing the notice stuck on notice board said, “I have pasted these notices urging ex-servicemen to provide complete information about their family to the DSB. For this purpose, we have stationed six block representatives in Raipur, Sahaspur, Vikas Nagar, Doiwala, and Kalsi. The board also operates in Chakrata but we don’t have any volunteer to work for us in that area. We need more volunteers to work in the far flung areas of hill stations.”

Col Madhav Mohan Kukreti, (retd), coordinating secretary general of the UESL said, “As long as the men serve in the defence services, they have to maintain their records regarding births and deaths in his family as per the service system. But when they retire, many of them become lazy about updating their enrollment under the Unit Headquarter quota. At times, they do not even update the change in their address and de-link themselves from the system”.

Wadhwa added in many cases, the ex-servicemen remarried, divorced or married twice which became a headache for the DSB as resolving disputes of claimants was a challenging task.